


The Hunt

by ApocalypseThen



Category: Mass Effect
Genre: F/M, Guns, Holodecks/Holosuites
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-27
Updated: 2017-09-27
Packaged: 2019-01-06 02:14:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,154
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12201837
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ApocalypseThen/pseuds/ApocalypseThen
Summary: Before the Armax Arena, there was Fornax Fantasies. Even if they honour her expired coupon, does Shepard know what she really wants?





	The Hunt

Shepard blinked at the brightness. Then she dove into cover behind the ruined doorway. A moment later the cracking boom of the rifle caught up with the hypersonic projectile.

The spall and patter of shards from the wall to her right had her surging out of the doorway in a burst of adrenaline. The second boom caught up just as she rolled behind a burnt-out skycar, followed by a third.

She grinned maniacally to herself, panting hard, clutching her pistol at the ready. Snipers. Didn't she just love it when she got up close and personal with one of those voyeuristic creeps. Nothing was more satisfying.

She was on the hunt.

\---------------------

Another day in the service of Cerberus, another mouthful of compromised principles. Shepard hung up her toothbrush and spat. Well, at least she got the fancy cabin this time.

She sighed. Her copy of Fornax was already looking dog-eared. She thumbed through it idly, slouching down in her chair.

In the heat of the moment, she didn't notice the coupon slip out and flutter down under the sofa.

\-----------------------

Shepard tossed a piece of brickwork in her hand, gauging the weight. She threw it, then dived out after it and sprinted for an alleyway.

A puff of dust in her path had her stumbling to change direction. A two-footed leap that wouldn't have looked out of place at the pool took her cleanly through a shattered window. Thankfully it had blown outwards and her landing was clear of shards.

Oh, boy, this sniper must have taken the same courses she had. He knew all the tricks. It was time to get lateral.

Shepard slunk deeper into the bombed out building, heart pounding. The snub nose of her pistol led the way.

She was _so_ turned on right now.

\----------------------

Shepard worked off rejection the only way she knew how: cleaning. It was a frustrating habit, here. She just didn't have that much stuff to organise, or laundry to do.

If it had been anything like her room at home, the coupon would have been lost deep in a stack of discarded trash. Now it was the prize of a sad little pile of odds and ends. She took a closer look.

She called up the cockpit. "Joker. What's our ETA, local time?"

"2100, Citadel Standard Time," he replied. "Why, want to hit a bar? I'll let you buy me a drink. Ma'am."

"Tempting."

\----------------------

She didn't think the sight lines on the second floor were good enough but the sniper had other ideas. He --- she? --- could thread the needle pretty well. He didn't have much of an angle, but then she didn't have another way across to the secondary stairwell. Every time she poked her nose out he sent another round whirring past.

Shepard sat back and tried to think straight. Every bullet that flew by had her jumping. She didn't normally lose her cool in combat. But damn it, this was _fun_. This sniper was proving to be a real challenge, not like most of the cannon fodder she spent her days mopping up.

She didn't for a moment consider the possibility that he might be better than her.

\-----------------------

The reception desk was unmanned, even though the sign claimed "Open All Hours!" In any case, Shepard was starting to get a bad feeling. The place looked kind of seedy. "Closing Down Sale!" should have been a big hint. She studied her coupon and wondered if she was too late.

A sleepy asari head popped up from behind the counter. "Um. Hello. I was just... can I help you?"

Shepard presented her coupon.

The asari giggled nervously. "Gosh, I haven't seen one of those in... oh, I'm sorry, this has expired."

Shepard folded her arms. "Kind of like my patience," she mumbled. She was a little disappointed. She didn't know quite what she'd been expecting. She turned to leave.

"Wait!" said the asari. "I'm sorry. You're the only customer I've had all day. Business has been off ever since the consort opened an office down the strip."

Shepard raised an eyebrow. "Is that the kind of business you're in?"

The asari looked discomfited for all of half a second. Then she smiled warmly. "Not at all! Here at Fornax Fantasies we offer a non-traditional, non-exploitative, fully immersive and holistic approach to making your dreams come true!"

Shepard recoiled a little from the sheer perkiness. "That's a lot of big words."

The asari pulled out a terminal. "Look, I'll give you the sale price plus my employee discount. Here's the menu. Take your pick."

Shepard scanned down the menu. Her eyebrows rose. She put the terminal down on the counter. "I don't understand." Elcor gangbang? Rated an average four out of five stars? Asari massage parlor (any role)? Three stars? Volus and Old Lace? WTF?

"Don't worry!" said the receptionist. "A lot of people aren't sure what they want, their first time." She tabbed at the terminal. "Here, try filling out this questionnaire. It'll guide you to your ideal scenario."

"Scenario?"

"I'll make tea. Take your time."

\--------------

His suppressing fire was coming from a higher angle. Alright, she could work with that. The scarred and fractured brickwork offered plenty of hand-holds. If she couldn't go through, she'd go over.

If she was him, of course, she'd try to lure her target into a false sense of security. He might very well be able to see a few feet higher than he was letting on. She'd have to really hug the ceiling.

Shepard tucked her pistol into her waistband and clambered gingerly up the wall. She inched out, getting herself as horizontal as she could.

He started firing when she was barely a third of the way across. Every few seconds, another crack made the whole wall shudder.

Her arms and calves were on fire and it felt so fucking good. She had to resist the urge to grind against the bricks. Shit, did he know what he was doing to her?

One shot came within a foot of her, a little piece of shrapnel pinging off her ass. She had to stop and catch her breath. Adrenaline and lactic acid and endorphins were getting her stupidly excited.

She was swimming in her undies.

\----------------

Shepard looked up from the terminal in annoyance, but the receptionist was nowhere to be seen. "Describe in single words, only the good things about your mother," she muttered. "What the hell? I just read Fornax for the pictures, lady."

She chuckled to herself and skipped to the next question. "You have a vial of poison and have to kill one person to save many. A little boy volunteers..."

Shepard put the terminal down in disgust. She paced the small room, blowing air out of her cheeks. "Ah, coupons be damned," she said finally. She turned for the door.

The asari receptionist re-appeared from the back room. She stopped, surprised. "Finished already?" she said. "Let's take a look!"

"Actually..." said Shepard, not quite knowing how to disengage without seeming rude.

The asari was scanning the terminal. "Uh-huh... I see... OK. Well! Looks like you had a little trouble!"

The perkiness was making Shepard's head hurt. She folded her arms.

The receptionist mimed thinking with her finger. "I'm not really supposed to... but I could just take a look in there?"

Shepard's eyes narrowed. "I don't know. You seem nice. I have a lot going on in here." She tapped the side of her head.

"Trust me, I'm a professional?"

Shepard snorted.

\--------------

Shepard went up another floor but then abandoned the secondary stairwell. Snipers had an acute intuition about their targets. It wouldn't be enough to do the unexpected. Ascending to the rooftops would level the playing field somewhat, but he'd adapt quickly enough.

No, she'd have to do something risky and dangerous if she wanted to pull one over on him. Something downright stupid, maybe.

The idea of taking risks was getting her excited. She had an unhealthy desire to be in the cross-hairs again. Funny, she'd never associated being under fire with the pure sexual rush she'd been feeling. That usually came after, when she was just glad to be alive.

She realised that she was grinning like a maniac. Close, but not too close. She wanted to skate the edge of the abyss. She wanted to get up close and personal with this sniper and she wanted him to put up a fight.

She smiled grimly to herself.

\---------------

Shepard looked out over the warehouse. A large space several stories tall and a few hundred metres across, furnished with baroque piles of half-installed panelling and platforms. The volume must have cost a pretty penny in rent. No wonder they were closing down.

"Hmmm, OK, let me just set up the parameters," said the receptionist. She bent over a terminal. "You can change over there."

"Change into what?" Shepard asked. "Can't I go in like this?"

"Oh all right, I'll pick something out for you," the asari sang as she tapped at the terminal. "Gosh, it's nice to be working. I was getting kind of bored, to be honest. Armax is buying us out. We're closing at the end of the month and all our serious customers got lured away by the consort's handmaids. Kids from the arcade come in here and I have to chase them out, but that's the highlight of my day. I have a degree in pyscho-sexual signifiers from Thessia, you know. I thought this job was going to be my doctoral thesis..."

Shepard tuned out the chatter. The status light over one of the lockers changed from red to a soft green, then it hissed open. She had to admit, the combat coverall was quite to her taste. Muted tones and rugged fabric. She stripped down to her undies and pulled it on. It was snug in all the right places, loose where she needed to be free.

She didn't have fantasies about being uncomfortable, the asari had got that right at least.

\----------------

Shepard popped the heatsink out of her pistol and started stripping the weapon down. Eventually she worked the battery pack loose. She peeled the insulation back off some wires with her teeth. "I'll raise you an IED," she muttered around a shit-eating grin.

She put the gun back together. It wouldn't fire, but it might make a useful threat.

She planted her explosive and backtracked. Getting back to the ground floor was as easy as dropping through the holes in the floor. She hummed a little tune as she waited by the doorway.

When it went off she left at a sprint, head down. Ten yards, then twenty across the street, up and over the hood of the aircar. The sniper finally caught up, but he'd clearly been distracted by the bomb and hadn't had time to adjust his range. Shepard found her sprint drifting to get a little closer to his line. Not too close. Just enough to feel the delicious heat. And also to frustrate the hell out of him.

She had a pretty good bead on him by now. She darted into cover.

\---------------

"Oh, you know about the haptic feedback, right?"

Shepard grinned to herself. The receptionist had played her role well, pushy without being a bully. A lot of clients probably needed that extra shove.

She hadn't asked what the 'scenario' was and the receptionist hadn't told her. Haptic feedback? That sounded fun. Her adrenaline spiked as the lock rotated shut.

When she stepped out, the hall had been transformed into a ruined city. A pistol lay to her right. Someone was speaking her language, clearly. She scooped it up and eased forward into the light.

\-----------------

Shepard took the stairs three at a time, not policing her heavy footfalls. In close quarters she could move faster than anyone could swing a long gun. Bold and brave would win this day. She leapt into the short corridor, kicked off the opposite wall, and rolled into the sniper's nest. She came up in a crouch, pistol ready.

He wasn't there. His rifle was, though, tripod nestled deep in the crumbling brickwork. She cleared the corners, covering them with her disabled pistol. Where'd he go?

Finally she leaned out the window. Maybe he'd been inspired by her wall-scaling antics earlier. Nothing.

The building was vibrating at a very low frequency.

Wait, scratch that. Her eyeballs were vibrating. "Ah, shit..."

Two hands settled on her shoulders. Long fingers spread. She felt heat behind her. She felt another kind of heat rising between her legs. She turned her head away from the window just a fraction.

She didn't want to know. She didn't need to know. She knew. She closed her eyes.

\--------------------

"Shepard. Do you need me for something else?"

She unfolded her arms. "Just wanted to chat. Thanks, Garrus."

She stopped in front of the door for a moment. She turned her head just a fraction.


End file.
